Road Trips

I have had the pleasure of driving long distances in the USA. The longest was from Minneapolis to New York in 2009 with stops at Ohio, Washington DC, Maryland and Delaware and finally to the Bronx. I was amazed how the Honda Civic Ex could fire so much and rev so smoothly. I initially feared that because it was a small car, the ride might be rough. Alas, it delivered both on good fuel consumption and solid engine performance. But it was a lonely drive. I then decided my next long road trip wouldn't be only me. My wife, Funmi - our youngest daughter and I did a trip to Dallas via Oklahoma in the summer of 2010. It was exhilarating. We drove a Chevy Malibu and was all fun.

 

2013 Chevy Tahoe

The next trip was to Atlanta, again from Minneapolis in early April 2012. This time, I decided on a bigger vehicle and booked the Jeep Laredo 4x4. Amazingly, I'd been inside of the Chevy Tahoe only a few times previously so when the CS staff at National, MSP offered me an upgrade from the Jeep Laredo to the Tahoe, I didn't think twice of it. After all, I was doing a long road trip with my wife and two grown up kids and everyone could do with generous leg rooms. I was asked to pick anyone in the lot. There was this shimmering black, well cleaned and inviting LT model standing buoyantly in a corner of the lot. The odometer had just about 500 miles, meaning it was fresh from General Motors' assembly line.

We headed out to ATL through Rochester MN - Iowa - Illinois - Kentucky - Tennessee - Georgia. Took us about 23 hours of driving and stopping, eating and refueling. Lost our way in the night at Nashville due to massive road constructions. I was a bit angry because I knew the spot where I missed the diversion to the detour, but then I realized there were hordes of other drivers who missed the exit and were also milling around looking for a way out of town in the deep, deep night. We invariably made it out somehow by following whatever the GPS said.

Coming back was more fun. This time we avoided Iowa but gained Indiana. Poor me, I do not remember a restaurant where we had breakfast and there were mosquitoes all over. The staff seemed unperturbed. On the approach to Nashville TN, we ran into this mammoth morning traffic. Nashville again! But it was all honky-dory after all said and done. 

And then, a more recent road trip; May 2013. This time from Minnesota to Ohio. Not as long as the ones before but essentially more prevalent. Mariam and I took off from Minnesota headed to Chicago for our first stop...

I had wished to rent the Honda Odyssey but it was not available in the Alamo Rental Car lot at Minneapolis-St Paul Airport. I settled for the Toyota Sienna instead. To our chagrin, it was not the most comfortable minivan, although it had very generous leg room for everyone. The gas tank didn't hold more than 390 miles at full tank! And it was a weekend when prices of gas spiked in the Midwest. It cost us a fortune to go and return.

The usual 6 hours to Chicago took us 8 hours due to construction, unexplained traffic stops-and-go and heavy rains mostly in Wisconsin, torrential from Hudson to Madison.

We got to Olamide and Bamidele's apartment for a quick lunch after rejoicing with our visiting in-laws from Lagos, Nigeria. Olamide's Mom and Dad were in town to witness and celebrate his completion of medical school. Soon, we headed out to start the second half of the trip to Youngstown Ohio. Graduation was next day in Warren, OH.

One of the several rest area stops

We turned the rather expensive toll payments to laughing matter. We had carried a piggy bank full of loose quarters we had saved over some time. We would discover that toll money had ceased to be in quarters but dollar notes. Like one place we paid $8.00. At another place $13.00 and there was a $15.00 somewhere too, the one end of Ohio bordering Indiana. We concluded even though toll fees were expensive, the collections would most likely go to the purse of the government for the maintenance of the freeways; unlike in other cultures where the money would end up in the pockets of the toll staff, their managers and top guns at the supervising government department! We reminisced on the ill-fated Toll Plazas in Lagos Nigeria and the regrettable state of the Lagos-Ibadan Expressway in spite of the amount of money collected at the toll gates. 

We had a beautiful hotel stay at the Quality Inn and Suites, another property of the Choice Hotels chain in Youngstown OH. Breakfast wasn't the best but being complimentary, we took it as part of our trip's memorable things. Luckily Olamide's graduation event went great. We ran into quite a few Nigerian families at the Magnuson Grand Hotel and Conference Center, the venue of the graduation ceremony. Some of the guests were well known to Olamide's parents. We laughed that Nigerians are everywhere under the sun searching for the proverbial golden opportunity. But we were proud wearing our flowing gowns, except Olamide and Bamidele who decked English attires.

Celebrating Young MDs at Warren OH, May 2013

Olamide's College of Medicine is originally based out of the Caribbean Island, run by an entrepreneurial family from India. The keynote speaker, also an Indian and childhood friend of the founder was a state legislator from New York State. He urged the graduates to see the world as their territory; nothing should stop them from succeeding as MDs.  We ended the afternoon with a celebratory lunch at a IHOP restaurant, Warren. Many of the restaurant patrons who were excited and enthralled at seeing us come in laughing and jubilant came to ask us about our flowing gowns and where we were from.

Going back from Warren, Ohio to Chicago took a shorter drive time. We explained to our mother-in-law as she requested, how many states we crossed so she could go back with the knowledge and share with her students and co-teachers. Back in Chicago, we spent another night at a hotel, this time at a Comfort Suites, Oakbrook Terrace another Choice Hotels' property. By the next morning, at Olamide's request, we were up early so we could make it to the church at 8:30 since he would serve as an Usher that morning. We enjoyed the service at Living Word Christian Center, Forest Park. They paraded a large "mass choir", God knows how many singers, men and women, young and old... And they sang beautifully.

We soon filed out at the end of the first service, spent time doing some knowing the community with stops at Sams Club and AT&T stores. Back at the apartment, we had lunch and started back to Minneapolis. Using our mobile phones' GPS (Nokia Lumia 920 and 900 respectively), we drove through roads we never used before, from Chicago to Madison. We avoided additional toll payments. (Not by design. I must have set both of our phone Nokia Drive GPS app to avoid toll gates!) The good thing was that we also avoided most of the heavy traffic leading out of Chicago to Wisconsin. I loved the escape and the fact that we discovered alternative routes to the eccentric Chicago-Madison part of the drive.

Sunset along I-94 West near Menomonie, Wisconsin 5/19/13

However, coming through Wisconsin again was hectic because of the same road constructions we had been through on our going trip. But this time, the cause was mostly silly. On the opposite stretch, I-90/94 East, a stalled vehicle was being watched by a police car and every driver on the WI - MN West axis chose to slow down and gaze. In America, traffic gazers tend to cause more delays than accidents. I wonder if people consider it entertainment to just gaze at stalled vehicles and cops. And the rains did not abate yet. Finally we made it home at 10:15 p.m., another 8 hours just like when we went to Chicago three days earlier.

I love long road trips but I enjoy them when I drive with my family. We load the vehicle with lots of snacks and occasionally take turns to drive. We stop randomly to stretch our legs, refuel both bodily and vehicular. A woman told us at church the other day, she had just returned from a road trip to Florida and she drove all the way! What men can do on long road trips, women can do also. And may be even faster!

Always on Facebook?

I'm amazed at the regularity with which my Facebook contacts try to send me messages. A Facebook message comes to you like a traditional online messenger. Yahoo and Windows Messenger services were well patronized before the advent of mobile phone text messaging. I wonder how many people still use Yahoo or Windows Messengers. Which ties up to my topic here. What all the online services have tried to do in the post mobile telephone era is to consolidate their operating systems (OS) in a way that you don't need to log in anymore to Facebook to be on Facebook. I am a Windows person. My Nokia Lumia 920 is primed to deliver notifications (they call it "push notifications") which you select at set up of your phone system. Push is also available now on Windows 8 PC's and tablets. Because I am signed for "push", my Facebook account is constantly updating all my friends' statuses, photos and calendar events, especially everyone's birthdays. Because I opted for push, it also means I authorize my OS to access my Facebook account and keep me "logged in" perennially. As long as my phone or Windows PCs are within internet reach, all my friends can see me "logged in". Even if I am jogging, sleeping, having coffee at Caribou or having lunch with my family at Perkins or Old Country, as long as I have access to the internet, it is assumed I am on Facebook. So, apologies to my many friends, cousins and nephews whose messages I don't reply to. Sometimes I see those messages coming in but at very inappropriate times, like in church services, organizational meetings, doing corporate planning and while driving. I will endeavor to reply when convenient. I'm sure I'm not alone and everyone can identify with my post modern social media and communication experiences. We don't know what things would be like in 5, 10 or 20 years from now. Let's just keep our friendship and enjoy whatever technology brings our way next.

"Black" Friday

One good thing about the day after Thanksgiving is that it has become a useful barometer for measuring economic recovery in America, the capital of the free world. Because it marks the beginning of the holiday shopping season, the more traffic the retailers see on their store floors, the more economic pundits sing eureka!

But to me, it was more than that. I was out to compare the situation this year with last year. I became a researcher of a sort. There were two major differences I could point to this year to explain really, there's economic recovery.

Last year, retail promos were more geared towards food products! Coupons were issued for low-priced, no additional purchase required TURKEYS. This year, even though the turkeys were there, you had to make purchases of $25.00 to use a coupon that allowed you to buy one turkey at $0.39 per pound (Cub Foods) or $0.48 per pound (Rainbow Foods). And there was a limit of "one per family". Those restrictions were not there last year.

Last year, my family had fun. We went from one store to the other to buy turkeys until our refrigerator filled up!!! Well, the economy was bad. And then I was recently out of job and we had to be more imaginative with our resources. This year, a turkey was at the cost of $25 of other purchases! I wondered if the retail big wigs at corporate concluded there would be no more free stuffs since people were coming out of a recession...

Also this year, seemed like the biggest gainers of Black Friday were electronics. I remember buying my 42" Samsung TV at $1,400 in 2002. (It's still working fine! thank goodness). On black Friday, a more advanced LCD unit sold for $498.00. The only group of products that remained unyielding in pricing was electronic tablet, the iPads and Galaxy Tabs of this world!

Okay, enough of market generalizations. Here is my biggest find of November 26, Black Friday 2010. I was at Walmart, Apple Valley MN. Walmart of course, is America's biggest retailer. For may years, it remained #1 of Fortune 500 companies. I was clutching the sales catalog which I pulled out of the previous Sunday newspaper. I arrived at this Walmart at 11 a.m. by which time the items my wife and I had penciled were all but gone. Then I remembered that the same time or even later in the afternoon on the Day after Thanksgiving last year, most of the Black Friday products were still available.

I hope Americans would realize the hand of God in the good turn of fortunes over the past several months. I hope individuals, families and business owners would know to include their personal financial turnaround in this particular Thanksgiving.

Yet, I have a feeling that as the retail floors are jammed, the credit cards will be equally filled. I saw a young woman carrying a 46" Sony TV, (just $798). Nothing bad in that except that it's more than just the price. It is the urge for materials that one needs to ponder about. Across the Minnesota River at the Mall of America, still referred to as America's largest shopping mall, true or false, was a sea of shoppers of all nations and cultures. The crowd was a spectacle to behold; the type you would find at Manhattan on a hot summer evening. Everyone was out for a once-in-a-year bargain, or so it seemed.

Let's praise the Lord at these times for His return to the economic fields of America, and hopefully the world. He promises that when we praise Him, He would bless us and all the ends of the earth would fear Him. (Psalm 67)

Which is why I really love Acts 14:17 concerning the recession and my personal situation; "Nevertheless He left not Himself without witness, in that He did good, and gave us rain from heaven, and fruitful seasons, filling our hearts with food and gladness." (KJV) Praise Jesus!

I barely could put away four turkeys this time around. God knows we bought many of them last year in response to economic realities. This time around, we would buy them when needed as we trust God to supply all our needs according to His riches in glory by Christ Jesus. Thanks for reading and Happy Thanksgiving.

My love for Psalm 65

Everyone has his or her favorite Psalms. Some of mine include Psalm 65, 67 and 148. But 65 trumps them all in my heart. I am reading this morning from the NLT, with its velvety rendition and sonorous, acoustic delivery. From the opening verse, you would know that David was at his best when he wrote it

1What mighty praise, O God, belongs to you in Zion. We will fulfill our vows to you, 2for you answer our prayers. All of us must come to you. 3Though we are overwhelmed by our sins, you forgive them all. 4What joy for those you choose to bring near, those who live in your holy courts. What festivities await us inside your holy Temple.

5You faithfully answer our prayers with awesome deeds, O God our savior. You are the hope of everyone on earth, even those who sail on distant seas. 6You formed the mountains by your power and armed yourself with mighty strength. 7You quieted the raging oceans with their pounding waves and silenced the shouting of the nations.

8Those who live at the ends of the earth stand in awe of your wonders. From where the sun rises to where it sets, you inspire shouts of joy. 9You take care of the earth and water it, making it rich and fertile. The river of God has plenty of water; it provides a bountiful harvest of grain, for you have ordered it so.

10You drench the plowed ground with rain, melting the clods and leveling the ridges.
You soften the earth with showers and bless its abundant crops.

11You crown the year with a bountiful harvest; even the hard pathways overflow with abundance. 12The grasslands of the wilderness become a lush pasture, and the hillsides blossom with joy. 13The meadows are clothed with flocks of sheep, and the valleys are carpeted with grain. They all shout and sing for joy!

As we are in the last five months of Year 2010, I bring to remembrance the promise of God to us at its beginning that it would be our Year of Flourishing. God's promises are true and this Psalm reminds me so. Through David's awareness of nature, it vividly captures the love of God for us: to provide for, meet and even exceed all our needs. No wonder some call Him "The Prodigal God".

Read the psalm from top down and down up, from the NLT, NIV, KJV or any version you choose. The meaning will come through. May the good Lord command flourishing in your remaining days of 2010. Amen.

Jalapeno-Spicy Praise

Asking a preacher how he got his sermon topic is as interesting as asking an attorney how he got his line of argument in closing a case. It's all about research. You consider what is going on in your life, the lives of your congregants and search the Bible for a relevant scriptural platform to present your story. Then you begin work, digging into scriptures, and prayerfully asking God that among your audience some will find it beneficial in their situation.

If you are running a thematic sermon campaign, it becomes easier to continue from where you stopped the week before; call it Part B, C, D or as many as you can continue.

Which is why I love the annual dedication of the month of June as our Month of Praise. Every time we meet in the church, Sunday, Wednesday, Night Vigil, all we are doing is dancing and jubilating like one of us just won some $m lottery.

We don't get tired dancing, jumping and stomping. We just get soaked in the spirit-filled euphoria. I finally found a name for our kind of praise, "Jalapeno-Spicy Praise"!

In the month of June, I preached three sermons on Joy: "The JPT Mandate", "For the Joy that is set Before You" and "Joy is not an Alternative". "JPT" is the abbreviation for Joyful, Prayerful and Thankful as Apostle Paul counsels in 1 Thessalonians 5:16-18. Three quick verses of God's will for us: (16 Rejoice evermore. 17 Pray without ceasing. 18 In every thing give thanks: for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus concerning you.)

In the middle of jubilation the other Sunday, I perceived the Holy Spirit said to me we should extend our Month of Praise to Three Months, all summer long, June-July-August. The joyous season continues. Even though we are praising God and bringing Him glory, honor and adoration, I have found that it always turns out to be in our favor, as individuals, families and the church body.

God does fearfully in our praise, Exodus 15:11, He inhabits the praises of Israel, Psalm 22:3, praise is a heritage of the redeemed, Isaiah 51:11 and it is a honor strictly reserved for the children of God, Psalm 149:9. What are you waiting for? Join us and dance away your sorrow, sickness, pains and sufferings. God will do fearfully in your situation.

You want to join the "Jalapeno-Spicy" train? Come 10 o'clock on Sunday mornings all July and August at God Is In The House, 2429 University Avenue W, St Paul MN 55114. Need a ride? Call 612-867-8911 and we'll make sure someone picks you up. (You can also visit http://www.godiith.com for directions).

Twelve Lessons of the Triumphal Entry

Ref: Matthew 21:1-11; Mark 11:-10; Luke 19:28-40; John 12:12-19
Palm Sunday March 28, 2010

Independence Day celebration in the USA is nationwide. The days before and after July 4 usually witness heightened air and road travel. Tens of thousands of people go to their parents and friends live to celebrate. Only Thanksgiving rivals July 4 in importance.

But for the Jews, Passover was more than just a holiday. It was a mandate God handed to them through Moses to remember how He brought them out of Egypt with a strong hand. It must be celebrated as a festival for seven days in Jerusalem and all the children of Israel must participate: "You must remember this day forever. Each year you will celebrate it as a special festival to the LORD”: Exodus 12:14 (NLT).

[The last Journey to Jerusalem – Landmarks: From Galilee through Jericho to Bethphage at Mount Olives (Matthew 19:1, 20:17, 29; 21:1)] As the Passover was approaching, Jesus took His disciples and began the journey to Jerusalem. He had been telling His disciples He was going to be delivered to death. Many of them did not understand what He was saying.

On this day, something unique was going to happen. Jesus would not enter Jerusalem unannounced. Quite unlike Him, He would be ushered into the city with pomp and pageantry.

The Triumphal Entry, as His coming to Jerusalem for the last time is called, would involve all the multitude of His disciples, the millions of pilgrims who came to the festival of the Passover from all over the world, and of course, the leaders of the temple, the Pharisees and government officials of a city and state that were intent on killing Him.

As we look through the record of the Triumphal Entry in all the four synoptic gospels, we can learn so many lessons and I am sharing twelve of them with us today. I hope they make sense to us and benefit all of our faith.

1. Prophecy is fulfilled
As they approached Jerusalem, Jesus sent two of His disciples to go to a nearby village and untie a donkey and a colt and bring them to Him. He assured them that if the owners questioned them why they were untying the animals, they should tell them “The Lord has need of them”. And that was exactly what happened in fulfillment of a prophecy in Zechariah 9:9:

“Rejoice greatly, O Daughter of Zion! Shout, Daughter of Jerusalem! See, your king comes to you, righteous and having salvation, gentle and riding on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of a donkey.”

This is just one of many Old Testament prophecies about Jesus that is clearly fulfilled in His ministry on earth. We can believe that the promises of God in His word cannot fail.

2. It is the preparation of the Passover
As I noted before, this was all in the season of a great national festival, the Feast of Passover. Jesus wanted to make sure no one would be in doubt that the real Passover Lamb was coming to the festival. Coming to Jerusalem unannounced was not an option. The ideal was to get everybody aware as He rides into the city with two animals, a donkey and a colt.

There was genuinely a lot of commotion as people asked, “Who is this?” The right answer was, “This is your King”. In the future, it would also become appropriate to add a second answer, “This is your Passover Lamb”; 1 Corinth. 5:7

3. The King, meek and humble
Why did Jesus not send those two disciples to the mansion of the governor Pontius Pilate to bring his well decorated chariot of horses? Well, By all accounts, the donkey and colt was more identifiable with the people than paraphernalia of power. And as Jesus taught in Matthew 11:28-30 (NIV), meekness is a virtue. He said,

28"Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. 29Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. 30For my yoke is easy and my burden is light."

Jesus is King yet He taught us the secret of rest: humility and meekness. Just as the prophecy of Zechariah noted, He is the King yet “gentle and riding on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of a donkey.”

Humility is a time-tested virtue that procures us favor and good standing. It is a lesson we must learn whether we are leaders or followers in our various life callings and ministries. Like the Amplified Bible expands Zechariah 9:9 to say, “He is patient, meek, and lowly”; we must follow in His footsteps in order to enjoy His promise of rest for our souls.

4. Giving to the King without pressure
No mention is made as to the identity of the owners of the donkey and colt. What we know is that they did not argue when the two disciples told them it was the Lord who needed the animals. What a joy must have filled their hearts to learn of the aftermath, the decorating of the animals with the disciples’ cloths, the riding by Jesus Christ, the shouting and singing that ushered Him to the city and the uproar that followed?

We can conclude that the owners would have followed those two disciples to witness what was going on. And as customary with Jesus, He would have returned the animals to them with blessings. Remember when He borrowed the boat of Peter to preach by the lake and afterwards He told him to “Launch out into the deep and let down your nets for a catch”. Peter said to Him, “Master, we have toiled all night and caught nothing, nevertheless at Your word, I will let down the net”. When he did, he and his friends caught a great number of fish and their net was breaking: Luke 5:4-8.

The same goes for the young lad who gave Him his five barley loaves and two small fish to feed the five thousand in John 6:1-14. Afterward, twelve baskets of the leftover food were gathered. You bet that boy was the beneficiary.

When we give to God and His gospel on earth, we can expect that we would receive in return. God is never a taker who does not give back.

5. Righteousness
A noteworthy aspect of the Zechariah 9:9 prophecy is what the Amplified Bible calls, “[uncompromisingly] just and having salvation [triumphant and victorious]”. Jesus Christ represents the righteousness of God. He lived on earth like we are doing today but He did not sin like we do. He preached righteousness and justice, although many in the political arena are debating this.

In the “Woe to the Scribes and Pharisees” sermon recorded in Matthew 23, He observed in verse 23: "Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You give a tenth of your spices—mint, dill and cummin. But you have neglected the more important matters of the law—justice, mercy and faithfulness. You should have practiced the latter, without neglecting the former”.

Jesus wants his worshippers to be all-rounder in their relationship with Him. Righteousness is key if we want to receive anything from God. As Philippians 3:9 observes,
“Not having mine own righteousness, which is of the law, but that which is through the faith of Christ, the righteousness which is of God by faith”. Pray to God today to maintain a life of righteousness by faith.

6. Salvation
When the people of Jerusalem got caught up in praising Him as He rode to the city, they were shouting
"Hosanna to the Son of David!" "Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord!" "Hosanna in the highest!"

“Hosanna” is a translation from the Hebrew word “hosha'na”, a shortening of “hoshi'ah-nna” which means, "save, we pray" (Psalm 118:25). Combined with the word “Yeshua”, it means "salvation, deliverance, welfare". Hosanna is originally an appeal for deliverance; and this was the intention of the festival pilgrims in recognition of Jesus as the Messiah.

If you are going through difficulties, you can call on Jesus with “Hosanna” to praise Him and at the same time ask for His saving help.

7. The Messiah
From His birth, Jesus had been named the Savior, Matthew 1:21: “You shall call His name JESUS, for he will save His people from their sins”. The multitudes in Jerusalem were shouting “Hosanna” to tell Jesus in recognition of Him as the Messiah who would deliver the nation from the oppressive Roman Empire at that time.

(Note that the trial of Jesus was by the Roman Governor and His crucifixion was accomplished by Roman soldiers at the command of the governor, Matthew 27:27ff. They were also to be bribed with money after His resurrection to lie that His disciples came by night to steal His body while they slept, Matthew 28:11ff.)

The lesson should not be lost on us today. Jesus is our Messiah and He alone holds the power to deliver us from every oppression, affliction, sickness and disease. He is our savior, redeemer and strong tower, our rock, fortress and refuge.

8. Jubilation and Celebration
As believers, we have every cause to join the rest of the Christian world today, generally called Palm Sunday, to celebrate the life of Jesus Christ. Our celebration should be rooted in His role as our Passover Lamb, the sacrifice that God needed to forgive all our sins and keep us in His family.

The totality of our faith is enmeshed in this final act of sacrificial volunteering that Jesus did. That is what the disciples and the pilgrims in Jerusalem were doing on that day. They were praising Him for the miracles, signs and wonders He performed. Today we not only praise Him for the same reasons but much more for our free salvation.

9. If I shall be lifted up on the earth – John 12:32
Praise attracts praise. As the jubilant disciples were heralding Jesus into the city on the donkey and colt, it was easy for the crowd and multitude of pilgrims in the city to join.

The other dimension of His being lifted up on the earth is His resurrection. It was the power of His resurrection that turned His disciples loose as great apostles and prophets following Pentecost. It was His resurrection that birthed the Church and the conviction of men like Saul of Tarsus who would take the gospel to much of the Gentile world.

We must engage in lifting up Jesus on the earth by words and songs of praise, by witnessing Him to our communities and showing the world His likeness in us through our behavior and actions

10. Naysayers
The dictionary defines “naysayer” as a person who habitually expresses negative or pessimistic views. Even when things are going well, a naysayer tries to cast gloom. That is what the Pharisees and the Sanhedrin displayed to Jesus on that glorious day of His triumphal entry.

“Some of the Pharisees in the crowd said to Jesus, "Teacher, rebuke your disciples!" (Luke 19:39)

We have to discipline ourselves to not be dragged into nay saying. Do you ridicule preachers? Do you cast a pity on them rather than be encouraged by their work? Avoid traces of negativism to things of God to ensure your blessings are not destroyed by careless, even if unexpressed behavior.

11. If these should keep silent – Luke 19:40
Jesus replied the Pharisees that if His disciples should keep silent, it was not the problem for the Pharisees to handle. We cannot keep silent. We must daily engage in praising and worshiping our God, as individuals and as a body corporate. The Psalmist says, “Praise is comely for the upright” (and 147:1).

Rejoice in the LORD, O ye righteous: for praise is comely for the upright. (Ps. 33:1)
Praise ye the LORD: for it is good to sing praises unto our God; for it is pleasant; and praise is comely. (Psalm 147:1, KJV). In other words, praise is a good and beautiful thing to do.

12. The stones will cry out
Jesus Christ warned the Pharisees that if His disciples stopped or were not motivated to praise Him, the stones would replace them. Are you motivated to praise Him on this day or you would allow the stones to take your place?

Conclusion
As Jesus rode on the donkey and colt to Jerusalem, He fulfilled another prophecy in the Old Testament:
“In your majesty ride forth victoriously in behalf of truth, humility and righteousness; let your right hand display awesome deeds.” (Psalm 45:4, NIV)

We must relate the Triumphal Entry to the dictionary meaning of the word “Triumphal” which is: pertaining to, celebrating, or commemorating a triumph or victory.

The victory of Jesus is our victory. His resurrection paved way for our resurrection. He gained the victory with His blood to spare our own. Death could not keep Him neither could the grave contain Him. Satan lost the ability to stop Him. All His enemies fell before Him. And we have been placed into the same victory as His. Therefore, we join in the celebration because we share in His victory and triumph.

If you don’t belong to Him, unfortunately you don’t qualify for His victory. Therefore, if you have not given your life to Jesus Christ, this is an opportunity to do so and you will be enlisted in His victorious army. Consider today the appropriate day to surrender your life to Jesus Christ, ask Him to forgive your sins, to come into your situation and give you your own victory as you say, “Amen”.

In My Father's House: John 14:2

After He told the 11 not to be troubled, Jesus Christ revealed to them the end result of our salvation: a furnished mansion in heaven. "In My Father's house are many mansions. I am going to prepare a place for you".

Think about it…If our earthly father’s house is so important, how much more important and secure is our supernatural Father’s house? These are a few things I know about my Father's house:

1. God Himself is there, with His Son and the Holy Spirit – 1 John 5:7, Revelation 22:1-5
2. Even though I live here on planet earth in the natural, I have been supernaturally deposited in my mansion above since the day I knew Jesus – Ephesians 2:4-8. Apostle Paul observes here that we can live on earth with heaven's inviciblity and mentality.

Benefits of my father’s house:

1. Love and not hatred – Ephesians 5:1-2, Ephesians 2:4
2. Rest from troubles – Matthew 11:28
3. Peace from unrest – John 14:27
4. Power and not weakness – Revelation 12:10, 2Timothy 1:7
5. Harmony and not disunity – John 17:21
6. Victory and not defeat – Revelation 17:14, Romans 8:37
7. Authority and not slavery – Revelation 4:11, 5:12
8. Abundance and not lack – Revelation 7:13-17
9. Good health and not sickness and disease – Revelation 22:1-5
10. Refuge from the storms of life – Isaiah 25:4
11. Joy and gladness, not sorrow and shame – Romans 14:17
12. Appointment and not disappointment – 1Peter 2:5-6

If I am troubled, I know where to run to - my Father's House.